While we can’t ignore the fact that U.S. inflation hit a four-decade high in May at 8.6%, I wanted to zoom back in on the micro and talk about Gitlab’s quarter. While the stock was up 20+% for the week until inflation numbers came out, the learnings for founders is that the DevOps market is early and customers are still spending real 💰.

Sid Sijbrandij @sytses

We’ve seen a substantial shift in how enterprises are developing, operating, & securing software by moving to a platform strategy. As a result, our One DevOps Platform is gaining momentum and broader adoption. Read more about @gitlab’s Q1FY23 results: bit.ly/3tfDnME

June 6th 2022

28 Retweets89 Likes

Not only did GitLab exceed target revenue/earnings estimates for Q1, it also guided upwards for Q2. This is clearly a bullish sign and you can read more here in the earnings transcript.

Ed Sim @edsim

the bull case for DevOps - great quarter from @gitlab $GTLB - still just second inning

June 7th 2022

6 Likes

Ed Sim @edsim

also product velocity maintained and north star despite size of company - need to keep innovation Security spend also huge and top of mind, shift ⬅️ to devs huge opportunity for growth Read more in earnings transcript seekingalpha.com/article/451675…

June 7th 2022

3 Likes

more in 🧵…

Whether you believe in the single DevOps platform model or the best of breed one, IMO there is room for both. Here’s a slide from Sapphire Ventures from last week showing the amount of devtools cos out there (this is just a fraction) along with another map from the CNCF.

Along with the GitLab earnings transcript, I encourage you to check out the presentation laying out its GTM model in more depth. For GitLab it always starts with the product and rapid iteration. The company has insane product velocity which brings in new developers who want to try the latest product feeding top of funnel.

🔑 is then aligning the sales motion to the user and economic buyer which is clearly laid out above. As I’ve so often said, every company eventually becomes an enterprise sales company whether you start selling from top down or bottoms up with a PLG motion.

Finally, since GitLab is a platform play, you can see from this product roadmap what is next to integrate. Lots of security offerings are featured on the far right hand side and startups should be aware that these offerings only exist because customers want them. No need to worry that Gitlab will kill you as you can still focus on the best of breed play which is a much larger market opportunity.

As always, 🙏🏼 for reading and please share with your friends and colleagues.

Scaling Startups

1. So important for founders on scaling their teams…read why adding more people is not a direct correlation to increased productivity

   SBF @SBF_FTX

   4) I've looked into hypergrowth companies. Time and time again, growing from 200 employees to 2,000 doesn’t seem to 10x your productivity as a company. In fact, sometimes it doesn’t even 1x your productivity. Sometimes, the more you hire, the less you get done.

   June 6th 2022

   48 Retweets621 Likes
   SBF @SBF_FTX

   5) Why exactly is it that hiring doesn’t scale the way it should? a) Coordination becomes really hard b) Diffusion of responsibility: if 5 people could theoretically do something, maybe no one will feel like they actually have to do it, and so it won’t get done

   June 6th 2022

   20 Retweets479 Likes

2. Thrilled for my firm boldstart ventures to participate in the OpenView PLG Product Benchmark Survey - some awesome data for founders - download here

Enterprise Tech

1. 👏🏼💪🏼 to Stellate on its $25M Series A funding led by Tiger Global

   Stellate ⚡️ @Stellate

   GraphCDN is now @Stellate 🚀 Announcing our new name and $30M of funding to build the global data graph 🎉 stellate.co/blog/graphcdn-…

   

   June 6th 2022

   43 Retweets251 Likes

   My partner Ellen Chisa has more on why we at boldstart led the seed round and are pumped about Stellate…

2. Web5 is here - Jack Dorsey just launched this and here’s the presentation

   TBD @TBD54566975

   Web5: An extra decentralized web platform Decentralized Web Platform - PublicThe Decentralized Web Platform Web5: A new evolution of the Web that enables decentralized apps and protocols. LET’S GO >docs.google.com

   June 10th 2022

   962 Retweets4,003 Likes

3. RSA Week - first time I have not been there in quite some time…but good news

   Aleksandr Yampolskiy @ayampolskiy

   I spoke to dozens CISOs at RSA. Trends: 1. CISO budgets not decreasing 2. Great public/private sector collab 3. CISOs wants 3 things: (a) Automation (b) AI/ML : turn raw data into 1-2 insights (c) Risk quantification: How do you measure security? #RSAC2022 #RSAC @security_score

   

   

   June 8th 2022

   2 Retweets8 Likes

4. On IT Spend from Protocol: “Cybersecurity spending isn't recession-proof. But it's pretty close.” and here’s a comment from the Crowdstrike earnings call on customer spend

   George Kurtz -- President and Chief Executive Officer

   Yeah, I'll try the first part. No, we haven't seen any slowdown in terms of the willingness to buy security. It continues to be the No. 1 risk factor for any board of directors.

5. Fortune 500 still spending on IT as Citi announces plans to hire 4000 tech staff to tap into digital explosion (Bloomberg) and increased IT budget by 10% to $10B 😲

   Banks are upgrading decades-old technology platforms to make services available remotely for both clients and workers, with multibillion-dollar programs that investors are watching closely for signs that this largess will eventually boost returns. At Citi, Chief Financial Officer Mark Mason said in March the lender raised tech spending by 10% to $10 billion last year. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boss Jamie Dimon said last month he just wants “to get it done” on the technology front, amid broader shareholder scrutiny of the bank’s expenses.

6. Docusign had a huge miss and CEO was asked about why huge sales rep churn…must read 🧵 and IMO, it’s simple, Reps stay if they make 💰 and if not go to next place. You can do sales math all you want, X # of reps ramped * XX% of productivity but end of day, need to sell and if not, they vote with their feet. Read on and also comments…

   Bucco “Buyback” Capital @buccocapital

   (1/7) If you invest in software and technology stocks, you need to read and deeply understand the implications of DocuSign CEO’s answer to: “Why are so many of your reps quitting?”

   

   June 10th 2022

   10 Retweets66 Likes

7. Trending this past week from HackerNews from Liveblocks, a port co.

   Notoriously tough to build, undo/redo in a multiplayer environment is even more fraught with difficulty. In this article, we will take you on a behind-the-scenes exclusive, explaining one of the most complex developer issues for multiplayer apps.

   Liveblocks @liveblocks

   Ever wondered how ↩️↪️ undo/redo worked in a multiplayer environment? Should another user’s undo command reverse your changes? Or perhaps just your own? 🤔 We’ve got you covered in this behind-the-scene interactive article 👇 liveblocks.io/blog/how-to-bu…

   

   June 9th 2022

   23 Retweets72 Likes

8. Yep, this is true

   Marc Benioff @Benioff

   Mint NFTs on Salesforce’s Platform: INTRODUCING SALESFORCE NFT CLOUD. Mint & Sell NFTs on a trusted, sustainable platform. Launch your brand into new digital worlds. Link data, communities, and wallets. Deploy from secure, sustainable technology. ❤️🤖 salesforce.com/products/web3/…Mint NFTs on a Trusted PlatformSell NFTs using Salesforce’s Commerce Cloud with wallet data connected to your CRM.salesforce.com

   June 8th 2022

   132 Retweets537 Likes

Markets

1. Sign of times: Coatue raising a structured equity fund, down rounds vs. structured equity, think debt with some equity conversion and not just your standard flavor of preferred, more a guaranteed interest rate + some creative equity conversion. End of day, it’s debt plus if co does well, some nice upside. Great opportunity for Coatue to help founders avoid down rounds but founders need to be careful when taking this capital…

   Coatue Management is raising a structured equity fund that could help cash-strapped startups stave off raising money at lower valuations amid turbulent public markets, and JPMorgan Chase & Co. is weighing a similar fund, according to people familiar with the matter. 

   IMO, if you need to raise capital, better to take the pain and new valuation vs. being too creative on maintaining a price which will take years to grow into.